Crimson Tide is a film which portrays internal conflict aboard a naval submarine during a

potential nuclear war. Throughout the movie, there are numerous suboptimal decisions made
due mainly to time constraints, focalism, biases, and emotional influences. Most of these
decisions are made by protagonists Captain Frank Ramsey and Lt. Commander Ron Hunter,
played by Gene Hackman and Denzel Washington, respectively. In the following text,
Hackman's character will be referred to as the captain while Washington's character will be
referred to as the executive officer. Even though the outcome of the movie was positive, many of
the decisions made by these characters were made ineffectively.
The main conflict aboard the ship revolves around a message fragment the crew receives
after acquiring orders for a preemptive launch. The captain insists the fragment is unimportant
and the crew should continue preparing their missiles, while the executive officer argues they
should determine the nature of the message before taking action. Both characters are guilty of
focalism which leads to an escalation of conflict and poor decision making.
The captain's focalism is deeply rooted in overconfidence bias. Bazerman explains
overconfidence bias as "too sure that we know the right answer, we become impervious to new
evidence or alternate perspectives" (37). In the original message, the captain was given orders
that he plans to follow; therefore, he searches for confirming rather than disconfirming evidence
as to the actions he should take. He has more experience than the executive officer, so when
questioned by the X-O he replies "I don't need to think this over." This should not be a system 1
thinking situation. He is confident and focused on the fact that the orders he received are still
valid, and if they are not carried out, the United States will be in danger of a nuclear attack. The
captain is also acting on bounded rationality. He is aware that the message fragment exists, but it
is an extremely important, tense situation, one which does not allow him the time to process

every piece of pertinent information before making a decision. His only concern is to carry out
the orders he has in hand.
On the other hand, the executive officer is so focused on obtaining the text of the
fragment that he decides to send a buoy to retrieve it. His decision to send the buoy is most likely
based upon an availability heuristicthis was the solution he was trained to perform. Due to his
inexperience, his response is one of ease of recall, but he does not consider the entire situation.
Although this decision would result in retrieving the information, the executive officer does not
consider the ship's state of silence, hiding from an enemy submarine. The buoy alerts the enemy
of their position and nearly gets the crew killed. Obviously, in this scenario his reliance on
heuristics was ineffective.
After the buoy debacle takes place, emotions are running high which is evident by both
characters' next decisions. Both are very angry, and as Bazerman explains, anger leads to an
increase of feelings of power and confidence and a decrease in sensitivity to risk (96). They
argue their opinions on the situation which results in the captain trying to replace the executive
officer and the executive officer placing the captain under arrest. Obviously, both characters
believe they have the correct plan of action, so they try to step over their line of authority. At this
point, neither of them seems to be considering the consequences of their own actions; they are
simply considering the consequences of the other's actions. These decisions are much less
effective than if they had detached themselves from their anger and developed a collaborative
plan of action. Again, they have become focused on their response to the message fragment.
While the captain is under arrest in his quarters, he experiences positive illusions of
overestimation. Sure that they must carry out the previous orders and that he is the person who
should be in control of the situation, he assembles some members of the crew to aid him in

forcibly regaining control of the ship. It is implied that these crew members decide to follow the
captain's request in order to keep the status quo. One of the supporting characters remarks
"we've been following the captain for years, and nowHunter shows up, and we're supposed
to follow him because he said so?" They know the captain is more experienced than the
executive officer and they, too, have overestimated the captain's control and performance in the
situation. He has obviously made effective decisions in the past; therefore, they believe his
stance about the fragment's unimportance. In order for them to take the correct actions, they
believe they need the captain giving them orders. This decision is effective, because the captain
is in fact the person who is supposed to be in charge of the situation. Also, the executive officer's
mutiny aboard the ship is one which required force to be stopped, and the crew recognizes this.
Conversely, the executive officer organizes crew members who are acting on regret
avoidance. The X-O, very emotionally, pleads with his followers that if they do not discover the
information on the fragment, they will take unnecessary military action. These crew members aid
the executive officer in his mutiny to prevent later regretting the possibility of commencing an
unauthorized nuclear war. Later in the film, the audience discovers the fragment did in fact
cancel their previous orders, so the crew members are satisfied with their decision. However, this
is not an effectively made decision, because there is no way the X-O could know the information
encoded in the fragment. There are no facts which support his belief, and if he is wrong, all those
involved will be punished for carrying out a mutiny. Regardless of the positive outcome, the
crew members make an ineffective decision based solely on their emotions.
In conclusion, Crimson Tide has many examples of ineffective decision making. The
characters operate mainly on their emotions and their focalism. Had the captain and the
executive officer calmly discussed the reasons behind their view on the situation, they may have

avoided the mutiny that followed. Crimson Tide, although suspenseful and entertaining, is not a
prime example of an effective decision making process.